Populism and Layers of Social Belonging: Support of Populist Parties in Europe

Although scholars hypothesised early on that social belonging is an important predictor for voting behaviour, its role for populist voting remains empirically ambiguous and underexplored. This contribution investigates how different aspects of social belonging, i.e. quality, quantity and perception of one’s own social relationships, relate to electoral abstention and to populist voting on the left and right. Employing multilevel regression models using data from four waves of the European Social Survey, this study finds that all measures of social belonging foster turnout, but exert an incoherent influence on populist voting depending on the party’s ideological leaning. While social belonging plays a subordinate role for left populist support, strong social belonging reduces the probability to support populist parties on the right. With that, the study analysis offers a nuanced view on how different dimensions of social belonging relate to electoral behaviour. By doing so, this study sheds light on what aspects of social belonging encourage, or inhibit, which form of ”protest at the ballot box.”